Sometimes it's nice to be proved wrong. Not that the doubts were publicly aired; just that any change tends to create unease. And especially when there is history of authority getting it wrong. The issue or issues in point? The changes in the way rugby is being refereed this season.

It may be barely a month into the Premiership season but it feels as though our rulers and the referees have got the balance just about right. I know it may seem strange for a defence coach to say so but attack is getting its rightful reward.

The pendulum has swung back to about where it was four seasons ago and that was a time when even rugby league friends were casting approving glances at the entertainment their union cousins were providing. Statistics can be made to tell many tales but simple maths shows that after four rounds of the premiership 103 tries have been scored as opposed to 88 last season. The reasons could be numerous and my guess is that the difference would not have been quite so marked had the season been heralded with the kind of rain we have seen over much of the country this week.

That said, I like to give credit where it's due and applaud the positives that have come with changes in emphasis. To a greater or a lesser degree they all seem to have been beneficial. I've seen no figures but the reduction of foreplay at the scrum – elbowing the "pause" instruction into touch – feels as though it's resulting in five minutes less scrummaging and more play.

Likewise the quicker release by the forwards has seen a vast improvement in the quality of box kicks from the scrum-half and open play where once there was endless arm wrestling to keep possession or run down the clock.

I'm also pleasantly surprised at the additional involvement of the television match official – the video ref as he used to be called. Cynics might have expected players to see the extension in off-field power as licence for endless appealing – changing-room lawyers asking the referee to "go upstairs" every time they feel aggrieved – and, as a consequence, time wasted.

Instead the restraint exercised by most teams has been pleasing, as has the speed with which the TMOs have generally gone about their work. We ask for consistency and the new tool is helping to give us that while clinical arbitration always tends to take the fire out of contentious situations. A few bad decisions and a couple of games where the TMO becomes the story could lead to an abrupt change of view but, as a coach, I know I often "read" a game very differently when I review it on tape as opposed to in the heat of the moment from the sidelines.

However the biggest round of applause should go to the refereeing of the breakdown and this season's insistence that the tackler roll away. Over here, there was a time when it felt as though more than 80% of penalties at the breakdown were given against defenders. Now the pendulum seems to have inched closer to 70%-75% and with it has come a better balance between attack and defence.

I say "over here" because Steve Hansen, the All Black coach, is clearly less impressed by the way things are going in the southern hemisphere and the Rugby Championship – the old Tri-Nations, with the addition of Argentina.

New Zealand are on course to lift the new trophy, but after scoring nine tries again Ireland in June, they have managed only seven in the past four Tests and Hansen flew into Buenos Aires for this weekend's game questioning the way the championship was being played in general and the Pumas' spoiling tactics in particular.

He may have been a little myopic when he criticised the way the Argentina forwards disrupted the All Blacks momentum in Wellington; they did after all push Australia close and drew with South Africa in the only game so far played in South America.

However his general point about the lack of New Zealand tries was interesting when he noted that in phase play they had almost dried up and that the majority of scoring was from set pieces.

Rugby may be all about competition for the ball, whether it be ruck, maul, lineout, scrum or tackle. Anything else and it wouldn't be rugby. But it helps massively if that competition is controlled thoughtfully and sensitively.